20-03-2004 00:30									#301
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They will need electricity before they can get AT, Arrian. and we can probably make some 500 gold, and can offer them 700 if we agree to delay our plans by one turn.

I was about to cheack the save to see what we can do, and how far Lego is from us. Look for an analysis thread soon...

DeepO

	20-03-2004 00:40									#302
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I figured that out, actually (electricity). See the ND contact thread, I wrote a draft counteroffer. What do you think?

-Arrian

	20-03-2004 00:40									#303
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I would be more blunt in your response to ND, Arrian. Tell them they get a 4 to 1 return on techs, if they get electricity and Steam from us, and that we are not going to give them a 20 to 1 return. It would not be fair. Also, stress again that we can beat them, Lego can beat us, but they can never beat us, as they don't seem to realize that.

DeepO

	20-03-2004 00:54									#304
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I see no point in taking a harsher line with them, DeepO. I find their "offer" insulting, but I've no intention of letting that come out in my communication with them. Further, do you really think they will listen to us if we tell them "look, we're definitely going to beat you to ToE, so do what we want."

-Arrian

	20-03-2004 01:04									#305
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Arrian, okay, I admit, I'm tired from the conference, so perhaps I'm over reacting. But please first of all read the new thread I opened on this subject before sending anything to ND. I doubt we need them, which makes it unnecessary to send 4 techs to them.

DeepO

	20-03-2004 01:14									#306
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Don't worry, I won't send the message to ND until we've talked it out a bit - and more people besides just you and I chime in.

I'll check out your new thread now.

-Arrian

	20-03-2004 01:41									#307
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That is more than fair Arrain. The problem is can GoW even deliver?

	22-03-2004 05:46									#308
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14:1... Nicely said.

	27-05-2004 02:20									#309
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*Bump*

Ok, While I know that this is basically practice, We still need to discuss the two topics on NDs' latest offer:

Here is the ommunique with ND, and the two topics that were mentioned were trading Tech at 20% of the beaker price, and the lux embargo.

On the former note I think that this is a fair deal, since we want them to stop helping lego, this helps us on the immediate matter of breaking Lego, without any long term problems that we can not plan for.

On the lux embargo, We are not going to lose much, obviously, and we will gain a fair amount of time, enough to hopefully cripple Lego permanently. Since DeepO and I can see no downside to this trade, and it has already been discussed, we have agreed to this.

But lets just discuss them again, shall we?

	27-05-2004 02:31									#310
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Krill, nice to dig this thread up. I don't think everything has been said about the topic, though, this is not just a trial run

more precisely to the price of techs: 20% is a bargain. We had something like 30% for electricity, but that was for a tech where there was no competition: either they bought it from us, or they researched it themselves.

Lego got 15% and lux (not known how many) for previous deals. If ND would agree to keep their lux for them, instead of selling them to Lego, I would certainly go to 15% straight.

Other things: we're currently getting one lux (ends in 9 turns, IIRC). What is that lux worth to us in terms of tech trade? We previously made something close to 20 gpt from it, this may have increased a little. 300 gold discount once the current deal ends?

What is rubber worth to us? Keep in mind GoW will also want to sell it to us


Second part: lux embargo: We need to have the other teams (especially GoW) into this as well. I already asked in the message to ND if they could legally stop the deal without breaking it. In case everyone could, it would be superb.

But at any rate, GoW needs to be asked to not give lux to Lego!

DeepO

	27-05-2004 02:34									#311
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Oh, and something else, Krill: maybe good to set some kind of internal dead line. For instance: this discussion can only take 2 days maximum, before ND is to be contacted again. (sooner is better, but leave at least a day for all to comment). We have regularly forgotten deadlines in the past, and irl I'm known to do it often

DeepO

	27-05-2004 02:44									#312
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Ok, you're the boss; we will contact ND at 16:00 GMT on Friday (the reason I said GMT is that I cannot work out time zones).

And on your issue of Lux, It will be our sixth lux, so it would be wise to keep it, and it also helps to placate ND, eg look at us, we are so nice, please don't invade us or we'll kill you (where have I heard that before), but it is not essential.

The lux should only be paid for in tech if they pay us some gold, eg an extra 450 gold, nothing excessive, but I would be willing to lower the amount we want since we would look more friendly to ND (and maybe a little more lax, so they may start to underestimate us).

Last edited by Krill on 27-05-2004 at 02:59

	27-05-2004 03:30									#313
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Krill, please, again, I'm not the boss! This is your show from now on, but expect comments from everyone. Hopefully

GMT is fine by me Plus, no need to get anal about deadlines or so, it's just that in case I forget, you just warn me

Lux: It's our 8th lux, in case GoW delivers gems next turn. But that one should be the one we trade with Lego: in case we could get others to follow us, I would be more then happy to stop that trade.

last lux deal, we gave them a discount of 200 gold on the price, IIRC. I'm sure they would welcome a 300-400 discount as well. And indeed, only discounts, we're not going to pay them for it

the price of rubber, however, is definately trickier.

DeepO

	27-05-2004 04:27									#314
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Sent message to GoW, seeing what they have to say about a Lux embargo - partial or full.

The value of a lux depends on how many you have. The price of a lux may, as many have argued, is whatever the market decides.

If a lux saves you from using the slider, its value can be calculated in gpt. If it bumps/keeps a few cities in WLTKD its value may instead be measured in spt.

The vending civ has no idea of the value to the purchaser, so will use theur judgement as to whether the price is right - hence the market decides.

	27-05-2004 13:12									#315
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I'm happy with ND paying 20% of research costs for techs, particularly if it keeps them from dealing with Lego. Once they are up to date, they could aid research for us and GoW by funnelling cash to allow us to go at 100% science (or as close as feasible), or some equivalent deal. ND gets a very good deal out of this, but at the price of being a tech or two behind sometimes, and being at the mercy of us not wanting to sell suddenly - so they are behind and have to do their own research.

Plus, at this stage where we are planning a mass upgrade, gold has a lot more value to us than usual. That's one odd feature of this game - if gold were only used for buying and selling, it would be pretty constant in utility. But since it can be used for rushing units and upgrading, there are times when having 100 gold is worth far, far more than a having a tech worth 100 gold.

	29-05-2004 03:51									#316
	Inflate your Upload Space

Ok, trial run: Since the time limit is up, I would suggest that DeepO PM Darekill and tell him that we accept his propasal of the tech trades, and follow up on lux: is there any way to stop their lux trade with lego?

Did I miss anything?

	31-07-2004 21:21									#317
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Looks like Darekill is nervous about GoW. Not sure whether this is good for us or not.

	02-08-2004 02:09									#318
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It is. MZ was nervous about ND before as well. Let them be divided, and look at each other nervously, and we might have an opening of bonding with one to take the other down. Otherwise, we're looking at a front which we can't break, even now we can't beat a joint GoW-ND alliance

DeepO

	05-09-2004 23:01									#319
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ND have asked us to sell Mot Trans. It was earlier sugested that we trade them MT in a deal for Espionage. Any comments?

	05-09-2004 23:31									#320
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I take it this is the cause for delay perhaps?

Maybe we can use this tech for espionage + some agreement agiainst lego?

	06-09-2004 00:15									#321
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In fact, this is the Espionage deal :

quote: We offer you Atomic Theory for espionage, which is a very good deal for you (seeing as Atomic Theory and electronics are both more than twice as expensive as espionage in beaker cost). All we ask is that we can wait until after Lego discovers it. Further, you receive Navigation from us as a gift.

- which Darekill has acxcepted (see log).

So we're looking at Electronics as well as Mot Trans

	06-09-2004 00:58									#322
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well then, I don't see any way or reason to let them have it for free. 2 expensive techs? Hmm.

If they swear on their children that they won't interfere with us, then I suppose we could come to some arrangement, they still need to pay us something though.

Perhaps we need to discuss this with GoW?

An odd situation, I can see where they are coming from, but they need to show us something.

	06-09-2004 01:05									#323
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At first blush this seems one sided. I am not sure what they ar eup to, but I would guess they could get MT from Lego for a backstab, so the fear of them having tanks is not as great as otherwise.

The main thing to me is that up till now they have not really done much for us and we have no assurance they will fight on our side.

So they need to convince us, it seems to me. Maybe I do not have all the facts.

	06-09-2004 01:11									#324
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Ok I read their post and it is not unreasonable. I think we should be able to reassure them that GoW is not coming for them before the war with Lego.


We expect to see them with MT fairly soon, do we not? If GoW was to attack ND before Lego, that would be bad for us and good for Lego.

I am not sure how much we should be willing to do to convience ND. I am guessing they are worried that it will be a gang job.

If that is the case we can point out to them that it would not be good for us and we are not part of it. If GoW is working with Lego to get after ND, we would be in a tough spot.

Anyway, I would just say that they should do as we are doing and that is to dismiss the idea of a three on one. If that occurs for us or ND, that party would be crushed regardless.

We all must move on as if the 3 on 1 is us on Lego. This means MT will be theirs in what 10 turns or they abouts?

	06-09-2004 13:46									#325
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We certainly shouldn't give them MT for free, or for anything below market value (assuming we have any use for 'market value' - do we need more cash at the moment or not?) Market value should also take into account the fact that we'd be making it easier for Lego to get MT (which might just bump up the price by a huge amount).

Agree with vmxa1 basically. We (and ND) have chances to win, which rely on other teams doing certain things (like GoW invading Lego). If that doesn't happen, we're pretty much doomed anyway, so we have to plan and play on the assumption that that is going to happen.

What we can do is let them know exactly when they can expect MT, so that they can time prebuilds exactly to get a whole bunch of tanks the turn they get MT, which will give them some protection against GoW turning their attention southwards once Lego is done.

EDIT: The danger is I suppose that they are using this MT issue to try and gauge whether they are in danger of being flattened by us and GoW, with the Lego thing being entirely made up (and we've talked before about the unstable nature of three-way alliances). If we refuse to trade MT, then maybe they take that as a bad sign, and ally themselves more with Lego again... There's a certain danger whatever we do here, so I think lots of happy diplomatic activity to reassure them might help.

	06-09-2004 15:26									#326
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I think we should reassure ND by saying that we think that GoW would be mad to attack them, that we ourselves are depending on GoW to attack Lego and that we'd be happy in principle to trade them Electronics & Mot Trans.

Our main concern is the devaluation of the techs for Lego, so we want to hold back, while their concern is that they could get jumped by GoW meantime.

We don't want to over-price tech to a customer who might go to Lego-Mart instead - as they did before. They've had good prices from us, but that's better for us than losing the customer. We also want to keep sweet with ND, to keep our options open on the road ahead, and particularly to make sure they don't opportunistically side with Lego at an inconvenient moment for us.

	06-09-2004 16:01									#327
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More controversially, should we start edging them in the direction of a GoW backstab once Lego is sufficiently beaten? Better to get in with the conspiracies early, as opposed to leaving it later and finding that there is already a plot in place against us.

In which case, we'd want them having MT relatively soon, to start building up a decent tank force to be a reasonable threat to GoW. The downside there is that if GoW notice that ND are becoming more powerful, they might just commit less to the attack on Lego...

	06-09-2004 16:14									#328
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Yes, ND Armoured Security = GoW Insecurity = Weaker attack on Lego.

However, we can say to ND that if GoW attack them, GoW will have effectively backstabbed GS, so ND could expect every sympathy from us.

	06-09-2004 17:29									#329
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This is a bit of a problem... and I didn't anticipated it

(PS: excuse me if I miss a few letters in my word: Thai keybard)

ND is of course scared, however we can't give it to them right now. It would make two techs cheaper to Lego, which will cost us two turns of advantage. Further, it will weaked GoW's attack on Lego, as they fear ND's cold war.

Is there any chance we offer a temporary protection pact to them? Say: the moment we see Lego discover tanks, we trade it to them. Before that time, we guarantee to declare war, and to attack GoW in case they attack them (we need to say this to GoW, obvioulsy). When we invade, this is nulled,. as we trade MT to ND as well.

This can work, if we are able to sell it to GoW as well: Say to MZ: "If you don't want to attack ND, it would be best for the both of us that we agree with ND that we protect them frmo you for as long as they don't have tanks. This to avoid them running to Lego for their techs, and to avoid them having tanks any sooner, thus requiring you to protect against them.

Think about this, I think we can sell it to both teams. Sorry if I won't be around for the diplo stuff, I'll try to log in again tomorrow (but most likely this will be in 36h from now, as tomorrow I'm flying out of Bangkok to Koh Samui...)

DeepO

	06-09-2004 17:32									#330
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The other solution in my eyes would be to sell MT to ND right now, but to ask a premium price (e.g. 40% instead of 20%). But that will at least dent our friendship with GoW.


Oh, addendum to previous post: we can ask that they break all deals with Lego. They are trading lux to them, little duobt about that. We can ask this as price for MT in any regard, preferably the moment we invade

DeepO